Sierra Nevada quick trip

Hubby used the last of his vacation days this week and we drove to Lake Tahoe, stopping in the eastern Sierra Nevada on the way up and down.  There were no clouds the entire trip, but we had a horrific monsoon storm here last night at home.

 The Alabama Hills in Lone Pine.

 Our favorite road in Lone Pine.

The ranch with cattle hides on the fence (outside of Bishop, CA).

We drove to Ridgecrest Saturday evening, choosing to spend a day home with the dog, who has dug out of the yard once this summer.  I reinforced the fence and she remained in the yard during this trip!  From Ridgecrest we drove up 395 to South Lake Tahoe, where we spent two nights, then turned around and we drove home.

FIRE in Aguanga

...sigh...there is ANOTHER fire near our valley.  This one is near Mt. Palomar and has moved down toward Aguanga, which is at the corner of Highway 371 and 79.  People posted the smoke from it on Facebook yesterday.  It is growing in size and moving east...So far 200 acres have burned.

Here's a link to the local news report:   http://www.kesq.com/news/cutca-fire-has-burned-200-acres/34349868

Hurricane Delores is HERE!!!

Ugh.  And, she brought muggy weather with her.  She's currently out in the Pacific Ocean, stirring up waves and making surfers happy, but yesterday afternoon she also brought a haboob to the Coachella Valley.  A haboob is basically a wall of dust which sweeps across areas and brings dust everywhere.  Our local news was watching it and reporting.  I was sitting at my laptop researching something and within 5 minutes, my beloved mountains... DISAPPEARED!  They were completely gone.  Then, winds came through our end of the valley, and poof!~ The haboob was here!  Good thing I did NOT get my car washed yesterday!

Here is a photo downloaded from the Toro Peak webcams.  The local news even used a couple of the webcam photos to show the haboob.  This is looking east, as it moved across the valley.

I wasn't happy with this photo, with the big beam hanging over it, so I went back and cropped it:

There now!  Isn't that better?  I love how the camera caught the shaft of light to the right.

Central Valley farming

Hubby took these photos as we were coming back down from Sequoia National Park last weekend.  It was amazing to virtually come around a corner and see ALL the vineyards, groves, and farming going on in the valley.  Wow!  It's incredible to see how much is grown in this area.  The farms here seem to have water, but those further west are suffering from the drought.

Sequoia national park

I must admit...Sequoia National Park is one of the most beautiful national parks I've ever seen.  It's about an hour from Visalia and the road into the park is very twisty, so be advised!  We didn't take the grandson on this trip.  He would have been car sick and besides his family went elsewhere that day.

I'm realizing that my mind and body just feel better in the mountains.  Maybe this is ancestral memory?  I don't know what it is, but I open up, relax, and even my legs feel better in the mountains.  I love to inhale the air, smell the pines, and just "be" there.

I find that during the school year, if I'm really stress, I HAVE to get up into the mountains.  Fortunately, Deep Canyon is only 15 minutes from our house, and I sometimes drive up there after school.

Anyway, we drove through Sequoia National Park on a Saturday.  Don't do that.  There wasn't a parking space at ANY of the sights.  They were all packed.  If we return this summer, we'll do it earlier and mid week.  We did plan ahead and bring a couple of sandwiches, and we did find a nice, shady spot to eat lunch. There are plenty of campgrounds and picnic areas to stop and eat and we also stopped at the Lodgepole market and visitor center.

I hope we do have a chance to return this summer.  It is ONE beautiful park!

Yosemite valley

It was a cloudy day when we entered Yosemite valley.  It had been cloudy for several days and a few days prior to our visit, the higher elevations got SNOW!  Yes, in the middle of July!  And, the waterfalls were back, running full of water!  :-)  So, we got a real treat.  The grandson woke up from his nap and he and I took a walk into the meadow.  He didn't know what a meadow was, so I explained it to him and he told me all about poison oak!  I guess he learned about it in school.

Central California visit

Hubby took 5 days off work, and our son wasn't able to drive home from Fresno this weekend to see his family, so we took the grandson to go see his dad.  We left Thursday morning and drove 5 hours to Fresno.  Friday we drove through Yosemite national park.  We bought sandwiches at Subway in Coarsegold and took him for a ride on the Yosemite railroad train.  Boy, was that a treat!   :-)  He had never been on a train before!  We learned about the different kinds of trees along the way and how the train last ran in 1931.  When its run ended, it let out a 10 minute whistle down the valley.  We stopped halfway on the tour to take on water and at one point the engine let out a huge blast of steam (2nd photo down...)  It was an interesting tour and I'm glad we took the time to go on it.  It is the Yosemite Mountain Sugar Pine Railroad.  We took one of the covered cars as it was starting to sprinkle, but there are also two uncovered ones.